Heater or ventilator having a revolving discharge

ABSTRACT

A REVOLVING DIVERTER FOR USE WITH A HEATER OR VENTILATING FAN OF THE DOWNWARD DISCHARGING TYPE. THE DIVERTE HAS FOUR OPENINGS FOR DIRECTING THE AIR INTO FOUR STREAMS. EACH OPENING HAS A NUMBER OF CURVED BLADES WHICH DIRECT THE AIR STREAM INTO A FAN-SHAPED PATTERN EXTENDING FROM THE VERTICAL TO A DIVERGING PATH. THE BLADES ARE OF SUCH   CURVATURE AS TO DEFLECT THE AIR INTO THE DESIRED STREAM WITHOUT TURBULENCE.

w. A. TAYLOR 3,623,419

HEATER OR VENTILATOR HAVING REVOLVING DISCHARGE Nov. 30, 1971 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed Sept. 10, 1969 FIG. I

PRIOR ART F i G. 2

PRIOR ART FIG.3

INVIfN'I )R.

WILL I AM A. TAYLOR AGENT Nov. 30, 1971 w. TAYLOR 3,623,419

HEATER OR VENTILATOR HAVING REVOLVING DISCHARGE Filed Sept. 10, 1969 2 SheetsSheet 3 FIG. II

PRIOR ART INVENTOR.

WILLIAM A. TAYLOR 6&1 My

AGENT United States Patent "ice 3,623,419 HEATER OR VENTILATOR HAVING A REVOLVING DISCHARGE William A. Taylor, Liberty Township, Ohio (5020 Market St., Youngstown, Ohio 44512) Filed Sept. 10, 1969, Ser. No. 856,609 Int. Cl. F241? 7/09 US. Cl. 98-39 3 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A revolving diverter for use with a heater or ventilating fan of the downward discharging type. The diverter has four openings for directing the air into four streams. Each opening has a number of curved blades which direct the air stream into a fan-shaped pattern extending from the vertical to a diverging path. The blades are of such curvature as to deflect the air into the desired stream without turbulence.

This invention relates to heaters and ventilators of the type which produce a downwardly moving stream of air and more particularly to an improved revolving discharge for use with such a heater or ventilator which distributes the air stream uniformly throughout a conical region. In addition this invention relates to a duct system so arranged as to deliver the treated air to the revolving discharge from the point where the air is treated and is thus forced through the outlets.

Buildings having large open spaces, such as factories and warehouses, are difiicult to heat uniformly without objectionable and unwholesome drafts. One approach to this problem has been the development of heating units which are mounted close to the roof structure of the building and which discharge heated air downwardly into the occupied portions thereof. A further development of these heaters has been the provision of a revolving discharge which directs the heated air from the heater in two or four diverging paths which are rotated to sweep a circular area. While these heating units provided a substantial improvement in the uniformity of heating over the earlier, fixed discharge type of heaters, they are not capable of providing complete uniformity. The present revolving discharge heaters project the heated air downwardly in the form of a hollow cone, thus leaving an unheated coneshaped space directly beneath the heater. At present this ditficulty is overcome by positioning adjacent heating units in such manner that the central unheated region below one heater is within the area swept by the heated stream of air from the adjacent heater. This arrangement, however, results in a substantial overlapping of the regions heated by the adjacent units and thus sacrifices a considerable portion of the range of each unit as well as resulting in the overheating of the regions which are within the swept areas of both heating units. The arrangements presently employed for directing the heated air into the divergent paths are also inefficient as they result in considerable turbulence in the revolving discharge portion of the heater and as they produce an air stream which is not of uniform density and velocity, that is, an air stream at a higher volume and a higher velocity is present at one side of the stream than at the other.

It is the primary object of the present invention to provide an improved air diverter for use with a revolving discharge type overhead heating unit which is capable of distributing the heated air throughout a conical region without the production of a dead or unheated conical region immediately below the heater. In accordance with the principles of this invention this uniform heating is accomplished by a specially designed diverter which is 3,623,419 Patented Nov. 30, 1971 capable of directing the heated air into fan-shaped paths extending from a substantially vertical position to a diverging position which are revolved to heat the entire conical region.

It is also an object of the present invention to provide a revolving discharge which distributes the air throughout a conical region with a minimum of obstruction of the path of air from the heater. This is accomplished in the present invention by providing a novel discharge opening which directs the downwardly moving air from the heater gradually into the diverting path rather than by first diverting the air in a vertical path to a horizontal path and then further diverting the air into diverging paths as is done with the present revolving discharges.

A further object of the present invention is the provision of a revolving discharge which is capable of diverting the heated air into a diverging band of uniform density while creating a minimum of turbulence in the air stream. In the present invention there are provided uniquely contoured blades in the diverter openings which direct segments of the air stream along uniformly curved paths to accomplish this objective.

The above and other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent upon consideration of the following specification and the accompanying drawing wherein the is shown a preferred embodiment of the invention.

In the drawing:

FIG. 1 is a schematic elevational view showing the air stream projected by a revolving discharge type heater of the prior art;

FIG. 2 is a schematic plan view showing the region heated by the projected air streams of the prior art devices;

FIG. 3 is a schematic elevational view showing the air stream projected by the revolving discharge type heater of the present invention;

FIG. 4 is a schematic plan view showing the area heated by the air stream projected by the revolving discharge of the present invention;

FIG. 5 is a side elevational view of a heater equipped with the revolving discharge of the present invention;

FIG. 6 is a transverse sectional view taken along the line VIVI of FIG. 5;

FIG. 7 is a transverse sectional view taken along the line VII-VII of FIG. 5;

FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional view, in an enlarged scale, of one of the sir diverting blades of the discharge opene;

FIG. 9 is a sectional view taken along the line IXIX of FIG. 5;

FIG. 10 is an isometric view of the diverter assembly of the revolving discharge of the present invention; and

FIG. 11 is a transverse sectional view of a revolving discharge of the prior art.

Referring first to 'FIGS. 5-10, the revolving discharge of the present invention will now be described. The discharge, designated generally by the reference numeral 10, is mounted on the bottom surface of a housing 11 which has a fan driven by a motor 12 for directing a stream of air downwardly. The housing 11 may also be provided with means for heating the stream of air, for example, with steam heating coils supplied by the inlet and outlet pipes 13 and 14, respectively. The housing 11 has a cir cular opening 15 in its bottom wall with a downwardly extending cylindrical flange 16 at its circumference. The upper end of the discharge 10 consists of a cylindrical portion 17 of slightly greater internal diameter than the external diameter of the flange 16 on the bottom surface of a housing 11. The discharge 10 is suspended from struts 16' spanning the opening 15 of the housing 11 by means of a vertical pin or rod 18 carried by suitable bearings 19 of struts spanning the cylindrical portion 17 of the upper end of the discharge 10. The lower portion of the discharge is of rectangular cross-section and is joined to the upper portion 17 by a sheet metal intermediate section 22. Mounted on the lower end of the discharge 10 is a diverter assembly 23. As shown in FIG. 10, the diverter assembly consists of a pair of rectangular walls 24, 25,.

secured to the midpoints of the side of the rectangular lower portion 21 of the diverter 10 and extending vertically downward therefrom, and triangular vertical walls extending from the ends of the walls of the triangular vertical walls 26-29 extending from the ends of the walls 24 and 25 along the sides of the rectangular portion 21 in a swastika-like configuration. The walls 24 and 25- and the triangular walls 26-29 define four discharge openings through which the downwardly moving air stream from the fan in the housing 11 is discharged. Each of the discharge openings is provided with a plurality of louvers or blades 3035 extending from the lower edge of the triangular side walls 26-29 to the adjacent parallel intermediate walls 2425. As shown in FIG. 8, each of the blades 3035 has a substantially straight upper portion 36, a substantially straight lower portion 37, and an intermediate portion 38 joining the upper and lower portions 36 and 37. The intermediate portion 38 is curved along a uniform radius to provide a smooth transition from the straight surface 36 t0 the lower straight surface 37. Opposite ends of the blade 30 are provided with lugs 39 at the curved surface 38 of the blade and with pins 40 for securing the blade to the end and intermediate walls of the diverter assembly. As shown in FIG. 7, successive ones of the blades 30-35 from the center of the diverter to the outer edge thereof are mounted with their upper portions 36 at increasingly greater angles to the vertical, the portions 36 of the blades 30-32 being substantially vertical while those of the remaining blades 33-35 form an acute angle with the vertical. The blades 3035 thus divide the downwardly moving air stream into seven streams 41-17. The stream 41 continues flowing vertically downward while the streams 42- 47 are diverted from the vertical direction by increasingly greater angles. It should be noted that the primary diversion of the air stream is accomplished along the curved surface 38 of each of the blades and that the uniform curvature of the surface aids in the diverting of the air stream without creation of turbulence. As will be seen from FIG. 10, four sections of the diverter assembly are arranged at right angles to one another and thus produce four air streams which also extend at right angles to one another.

In order to uniformly distribute the air streams throughout a conical region the discharge and diverter assembly 10, 23 is revolved about the shaft 18 by means of a gear motor 50 mounted on a housing 11 by a suitable bracket 51. A belt 52 passing around the cylindrical upper portion 1'7 of the discharge 10 is driven by a pulley 53 connected to the gear motor 50.

FIG. 11 shows, schematically, a revolving discharge of the prior art. Such a discharge 62 is of rectangular crosssection and has a louvered opening '65 on each of its side Walls. The downwardly moving stream of air enters the discharge 62 through an opening in its top wall and strikes the bottom wall 66 of the discharge. This arrangement produces considerable turbulence Within the housing 62 and results in an uneven discharge of air through the openings 65, the major portion 67 of the air stream being discharged through the lower end of the opening 65, at very high velocity, while only a small quantity of air 68, at low velocity, is discharged through the upper portions of the openings 65. As described above, the discharge opening of the present invention result in a more uniform distribution of the air along the discharge opening and inconsequential amount of turbulence. It should also be noted that the air stream 63 projected from the discharge 4 62 of the prior art, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, is not projected downwardly from the heater and, as a result, sweeps a ring-like area 64 on the floor below the heater. No air however is directed downwardly into the conical region and the circular area within the ring-like zone is not heated. As shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, the air stream 60 projected by the discharge 10 of the present invention, which is composed of the air streams 41-47, sweeps a circular area 61 on the floor of the building which does not have a central, unheated region. As was described above, this is accomplished by means of the blades 30-35 which are of such a shape and mounted in such a manner relative to one another as to divide the downwardly moving stream of air into layers which are diverted successively further of the vertical.

It should now be apparent that there has been provided a novel revolving discharge for a heater or ventilator which fulfills the objects initially set out. It should also be apparent that modifications may be made in and to the preferred embodiment of the invention described. For example, a bafile may be provided within the diverter housing 10 to block off a pair of opposed diverter openings when it is desired to project a stream of air at higher velocity.

I claim:

1. In a heater or ventilation unit having an enclosure with an opening in its bottom surface and a fan for directing a stream of air downwardly through the opening, the improvement comprising:

a housing mounted immediately below the enclosure,

having an opening in its upper surface communicating with the opening of the enclosure, the housing being rotatable about a vertical axis extending through the center of the opening of the enclosure, the housing having solid sidewalls and a square opening in its bottom surface concentric with the vertical axis; and

a diverter assembly aifixed to and rotating with the housing, the diverter assembly comprising four vertically extending rectangular walls joined to one another in mutually perpendicular relation and to the midpoints of the sides of the square opening, the walls dividing the square opening into four equal sized square openings, a vertical end wall extending along alternate half portions of the square opening of the housing, and a plurality of blades extending in parallel relation to each other from each end wall to the parallel rectangular wall, the blades being mounted on a line extending from the corner of the square opening of the housing to the lower end of the rectangular wall.

2. The improvement according to claim 1 wherein said blades from said rectangular wall to said housing are mounted at increasingly greater angles to the horizontal.

3. The improvement according to claim 1 wherein each of said blades has a substantially fiat upper portion, a substantially flat lower portion angled relative to said upper portion, and an intermediate portion of uniform curvature joining said upper and lower portions and forming a smooth transition therebetween.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,390,630 12/1945 Wheeler 98-40 2,396,025 3/1946 Seid 98-40 2,812,925 11/1957 Young 98-40 X 3,063,357 11/1962 Eberhart 98-110 X WILLIAM E. WAYNER, Primary Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 

